Black Ice
by under.the.bridge.downtown
Summary: She found him slumped against a thrown of broken toys and screaming faces, all frozen in fear. He looked different, thinner and malnourished. His skin, once tanned and soft, had grayed and hardened like ice. His dark hair was slicked back, matted and dirty and black. Moon, she'd never seen anything so void of any light. He was as beautiful and as dark as ever, her shadow man.


She'd been just a baby the first time she sees him. He and her father had been friends then, brothers during the Golden Age. They had fought side by side during the Nightmare Wars, long before his soul had been corrupted and tortured. He had cooed over her crib next to Tooth, with his arm wrapped around Sandy's shoulder and laughing louder than the rest. She can still remember looking up at his dark smile and feeling a delightful chill. His eyes; killers eyes, soldier's eyes, had crinkled around the edges while he held her, dancing around the garden and laughing when she did.

But then she turned 75 and he was gone. Papa had warned her to stay away from him. "He's dangerous." They said. "He'll kill you on the spot Winnie."

She'd cried and cried when they took her friend away.

Where was Kozi? She wailed. Where was my shadow man?

Nobody answered her.

But how could they possibly ever expect her to be afraid? She couldn't fear the dark, no matter how much _he_ wished she would. How could she ever be scared when she knew he'd be there to protect her? He'd **promised** to always protect her. He'd **promised.** And perhaps it was foolish to put such faith in a child's agreement but she couldn't bring herself to doubt. Not her Kozi.

She doesn't see him again for another 125 years. She's grown now, not the little girl he used to chase through the snowdrifts. The years have been kinder to her than they have been to him. White hair that tickles the backs of her knees, the slim build of her ballerina mother and the large blue eyes taken from her father. Eyes overflowing with the wonder and magic that her world has to offer.

She had been visiting her mother in the Unseelie Court. It would later become apparent that she had inherited her father's soft spot for troubled souls and lost cases, her dark and dangerous queen mother proof of this flaw. She'd felt him for the first time in centuries. This power was dull and mangled and cracked but it was unmistakably Kozmotis. She would recognize that tickling sensation on the back of her neck anywhere. He was easy to find after that, she just followed that feeling until she came to an old broken bed frame. Winnie rolled her eyes at that, Kozi has always had a flare for the dramatics. Winter hadn't hesitated to drop down into the never ending black hole.

After all, she wasn't afraid of the dark. She _was_ half Unseelie.

She found him slumped against a thrown of broken toys and screaming faces, all frozen in fear. He looked different, thinner and malnourished. His skin, once tanned and soft, had grayed and hardened like ice. His dark hair was slicked back, matted and dirty and **black**. Moon, she'd never seen anything so void of any light.

For a split second, seeing him there so broken and dangerous, she thought he truly was the thing of nightmares. She should fear him. She should be terrified.

She should run.

But her feet wouldn't move.

She should scream.

But her mouth stayed clamped shut.

He was as beautiful and as dark as ever. Winnie loved him, he was her shadow man and she wouldn't abandon him just as all the others had.

"Kozi?" Her voice shook with anticipation and excitement. He didn't hear her. That or chooses to ignore her. The latter seemed more likely. She takes a few steps towards him, white fingers outstretched and reaching for his shoulder. Maybe he had forgotten his name? What was it that the others all called him now? Oh yes.

"Pitch?" He flinches away from the noise and shrinks farther into his seat. Winter froze, raising her hands as she would to pacify an injured animal.

"Pitch? It's Winnie. It's your little icicle. Please, talk to me." He ignores her, continuing to stare down into the canyons that were carved around them. As she gets closer, she can just make out the slightest sound of muttering. She can't hear his words but his voice; dry and rough from years of disuse, forced a spike of fear of stab annoyingly in the back of her mind. Her heart picks up speed but she keeps creeping forward.

"Don't do that Kozi. Not to me." She wants to wrap herself in his cloak and never let him out of her sight again. She's not sure she can stand another decade away from him. But just as she's about to yank him from his spot, he slinks away into the shadows on the wall and she only grabs thin air.

"Pitch! Pitch! Please don't hide from me again!" He doesn't answer. He's already gone. Winter sinks into the place where he had just sat. She was so close! He had been right there! She wraps her arms around herself and hides behind a thin curtain of her hair.

"Please don't leave me." Her begging echos off the empty walls with no remorse.

When she returns to her mother's court, the demons and dark fey curl away from her. Hissing and spitting in fear and malice. She's not welcome here, not the daughter of St. North. Winnie ignores them, walking on with sightless eyes and kicking the foul creatures out of her way as she passes. She doesn't tell anyone she's seen him. Not her mother. Not her Father. And certainly not his daughter, still heartbroken and alone after all these years without him. Always putting on a brave face for those humans she so adores but who poison her more and more with each passing hour.

She thinks Sandy may know, but he won't tell. No, he won't. He just gives her a sad smile when she comes home again and slips a vile of golden sand into her palm, pressing it tightly against the cracks in her skin. It won't keep his nightmares out for long, not if he really wants to get in, but it will quiet her mind for a night or two. Just long enough to lock this memory away into the pit of her mind and and forget for a while.


End file.
